ᴄʜᴀᴘᴛᴇʀ 44

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𝖂hen Romie wakes, she can't believe how much better she feels.

As though it's a prank, a trick, she stretches out her sleepy limbs, waiting for the brutal heaviness that feels like hell dragging her down through the earth's surface to kick back in. It doesn't, and neither does the searing burning sensation down at her gut. For days on end it's been unbearable, a wicked reminder that even during daylight hours, wide awake, Romie can't escape him.

He's not here. Not in her dreams, not in her mind, not in her skin. That role's been taken by someone else. The corners of her lips quirk, recognising the slick hand flat against the marred skin of her abdomen. She can't believe how much better she feels, she can't believe more how little alarm and unease stirs inside her chest at the prospect of him feeling where she's scarred, where she's broken. Where control had been cruelly snatched away.

It's an inconvenient angle for him, a touch that would have been a great deal easier if it were the other hand. But he couldn't hold hers that way. The knuckle strokes that transport her to a paradise that tops utopia have been adjourned for now, the still tips of his fingers resting in position for when the time comes to resume working their magic again. Romie cracks open an eye, pouncing on the opportunity to absorb the uninterrupted image of Regulus Black sleeping.

He's not snoring, a normal, human habit undoubtedly broken during naps as a baby. Instead, light, even inhales and exhales sound from him, in perfect harmony to the steady rise and falls of his exposed chest. His hair's a black spillage across the pillow, one that she wouldn't mind taking one for the team and tidying. Or messing up further. When the Adam's apple of his throat bobs, Romie leans in, sweetly admiring the plentiful protrusion.

And then the sharp edge of his jaw she's wanted to sink her teeth into long before nun skirts and outwitting matches and fake dating schemes. She noses the perfect ninety degree angle below his earlobe, humming against the smooth skin when she spots the subtle flutter of eyelashes. The small part of his mouth drops to a wide oval, encouraging Romie alone to continue the admiration parade without the subsequent rumbled groan.

It's slow, wickedly so, and yet Regulus can't think of a better wake up call, even if that means being teased to high heaven. He's grown rather fond of Romie Lupin's teasing. Of that elfin charm that separates her from the rest. The dainty hand snuggled underneath his disappears, the loss not mourned too badly because then it's sneaking into the strictly forbidden territory that's not so strictly forbidden when it's her.

Romie knows as much too, the downward curve of lips against his throat proof. His heart wears its own smile and his chest swells with a triumph second to none. That's five. Five real, genuine and true smiles for him. Because of him. Regulus is hardly ever the reason for smiles, but he thinks this one, just hers, makes up for a million.

When she goes in for double trouble, tangling fingers into his hair and sucking his pulse, Regulus slides his hand from one side of her abdomen to the other and around to base of her spine. Between the two dimples. It's a move both clever and intentional, providing support for the new position they find themselves in a heated blur of a moment. Regulus' eyes open, taking a minute to appreciate the sight blessing them.

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